Maldivian writing systems

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Maldivian writing systems" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (July 2020) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Several Dhivehi scripts have been used by Maldivians during their history. The early Dhivehi scripts fell into the abugida category, while the more recent Thaana has characteristics of both an abugida and a true alphabet. An ancient form of Nagari script, as well as the Arabic and Devanagari scripts, have also been extensively used in the Maldives, but with a more restricted function. Latin was official only during a very brief period of the Islands' history.^[1]

The first Dhivehi script likely appeared in association with the expansion of Buddhism throughout South Asia. This was over two millennia ago, in the Mauryan period, during emperor Ashoka's time. Manuscripts used by Maldivian Buddhist monks were probably written in a script that slowly evolved into a characteristic Dhivehi form. Few of those ancient documents have been discovered and the early forms of the Maldivian script are only found etched on a few coral rocks and copper plates.